Dassault Systèmes provides a knowledge base of questions and answers, solutions to questions that we have answered, and guidelines on how to use Abaqus, Engineering Process Composer, Isight, Tosca, fe-safe, and other SIMULIA products. The knowledge base is available by using the Search our Knowledge option on www.3ds.com/support.

By using the online support system, you can also submit new requests for support. All support/service requests are tracked. If you contact us by means outside the system to discuss an existing support problem and you know the support request number, please mention it so that we can query the support system to see what the latest action has been.

Technical support engineers are available to assist in clarifying Abaqus features and checking errors by giving both general information on using Abaqus and information on its application to specific analyses. If you have concerns about an analysis, we suggest that you contact us at an early stage, since it is usually easier to solve problems at the beginning of a project rather than trying to correct an analysis at the end.

To access support, you can select the SUBMIT A REQUEST link at Support - Dassault Systèmes to see the online support tool or obtain support office contact information from the SIMULIA Locations page at www.3ds.com/simulia to request support by telephone.

Please have the following information ready before calling the technical software support hotline, and include it in any written contacts:

When calling for support about a specific problem, any available Abaqus output files may be helpful in answering questions that the support engineer may ask you.

The support engineer will try to diagnose your problem from the model description and a description of the difficulties you are having. The more detailed information you provide, the easier it will be for the support engineer to understand and solve your problem.

If the support engineer cannot diagnose your problem from this information, you may be asked to supply the input data. The data can be attached to a support request in the online system. It can also be sent by means of email or ftp.

If you are contacting us via telephone to discuss an existing problem, please give the receptionist the support engineer's name. If you are contacting us via email, please include the support engineer's name at the top of any email correspondence. If you are contacting us online (preferred for written communication), update the existing support request for the problem.

Systems support engineers can help you resolve issues related to the installation and running of Abaqus, including licensing difficulties, that are not covered by technical software support. Support is available by selecting the SUBMIT A REQUEST link at Support - Dassault Systèmes or from regional support offices. Regional contact information is available from the Locations page.

You should install Abaqus by carefully following the instructions in the Abaqus Installation and Licensing Guide. If you are able to complete the installation, please make sure that the product verification procedure was run successfully at the end of the installation procedure. Successful verification for licensed products would indicate that you can run these products on your computer; unsuccessful verification for licensed products indicates problems with the installation or licensing (or both). If you encounter problems with the installation, licensing, or verification, first review the instructions in the Abaqus Installation and Licensing Guide to ensure that they have been followed correctly. If this does not resolve the problems, consult the knowledge base for information about known installation problems. If this does not address your situation, please create a support request in the online system and describe your problem, including the output from abaqus info=support. If you call or email us about a problem (instead of communicating using the online support system), please provide the output from abaqus info=support. It is important that you provide as much information as possible about your problem: error messages from an unsuccessful analysis, output from the abaqus info=support command, etc.

Abaqus/CAE User's Guide: This guide includes detailed descriptions of how to use Abaqus/CAE for model generation, analysis, and results evaluation and visualization. Abaqus/Viewer users should refer to the information on the Visualization module in this guide.

Abaqus Analysis User's Guide: This guide contains a complete description of the elements, material models, procedures, input specifications, etc. It is the basic guide for Abaqus/Standard, Abaqus/Explicit, and Abaqus/CFD. Both input file usage and Abaqus/CAE usage information are provided in this guide.

Abaqus Example Problems Guide: This guide contains detailed examples from which users can learn how to run simulations involving nontrivial physics. Many of the examples are worked with several different element types, mesh densities, and other variations. Cases include large motion of an elastic-plastic pipe hitting a rigid wall; inelastic buckling collapse of a thin-walled elbow; explosive loading of an elastic, viscoplastic thin ring; consolidation under a footing; buckling of a composite shell with a hole; and deep drawing of a metal sheet. It is generally useful to look for relevant examples in this guide and to review them when embarking on a new class of problem.

Abaqus Benchmarks Guide: This guide contains benchmark problems that provide evidence that the software can reproduce a result from a benchmark defined by an external body or institution such as NAFEMS. The problems are sufficient to show accuracy and convergence compared to the benchmark data. The NAFEMS benchmark problems are included in this guide.

Getting Started with Abaqus/CAE: This guide is a self-paced tutorial designed to help new users become familiar with using Abaqus/CAE to create solid, shell, and beam and truss models; Abaqus/Standard and Abaqus/Explicit to perform static, quasi-static, and dynamic stress analysis simulations; and Abaqus/CFD to model fluid flow. It contains a number of fully worked examples that provide practical guidelines for performing structural analyses with Abaqus. In addition, several comprehensive tutorials are provided to introduce users familiar with the Abaqus solver products to the Abaqus/CAE interface.

Using Abaqus Online Documentation: This guide contains instructions for navigating, viewing, and searching the Abaqus HTML and PDF documentation.

Abaqus Keywords Reference Guide: This guide contains a complete description of all the input options that are available in Abaqus/Standard, Abaqus/Explicit, and Abaqus/CFD.

Abaqus Theory Guide: This guide contains detailed, precise discussions of all theoretical aspects of Abaqus. It is written to be understood by users with an engineering background.

Abaqus Verification Guide: This guide contains test cases that provide evidence that the implementation of the numerical model produces the expected results for one or several well-defined options in the code. It may be useful to run these problems when learning to use a new capability. In addition, the supplied input data files provide good starting points to check the behavior of elements, materials, etc.

Abaqus User Subroutines Reference Guide: This guide contains a complete description of all the user subroutines available for use in Abaqus analyses. It also discusses the utility routines that can be used when writing user subroutines.

Abaqus Glossary: This guide defines technical terms as they apply to the Abaqus Unified FEA Product Suite.

Abaqus Release Notes: This guide contains brief descriptions of the new features available in the latest release of the Abaqus product line.

Abaqus Scripting User's Guide: This guide provides a description of the Abaqus Scripting Interface, which is an application programming interface (API) to the models and data used by Abaqus. The guide describes how commands can be used to create and analyze Abaqus/CAE models, to view the results of the analysis, and to automate repetitive tasks. It also contains information on using the Abaqus Scripting Interface or C++ as an API to the output database.

Abaqus Scripting Reference Guide: This guide provides a command reference that lists the syntax of each command in the Abaqus Scripting Interface.

Abaqus GUI Toolkit User's Guide: This guide provides a description of the Abaqus GUI Toolkit, which allows you to customize the Abaqus/CAE Graphical User Interface by creating your own dialog boxes, GUI modules, and even applications. The guide explains how to use the components of the toolkit by providing snippets of example code.

Abaqus GUI Toolkit Reference Guide: This guide provides a complete listing of the Abaqus GUI Toolkit programming interface, but it does not describe how to use the toolkit. For an explanation of how to use the Abaqus GUI Toolkit, see the Abaqus GUI Toolkit User's Guide.

Abaqus Installation and Licensing Guide: This guide describes how to install Abaqus and how to configure the installation for particular circumstances.